Gaming

Dawncaster is a really solid roguelike deck builder. One time payment, no ads, paid DLCs with additional archetypes and maps.

I keep coming back to Plague

Just found out that Wildfrost has an android port. It's a really fun rougelite deck builder.

True surf is a dope surfing simulator. Only catch is that unlocking boards is an insane grind, but none of them are better or worse really just different.

Mindustry : tower defense x factorio

Dosbox + Hexxagon

If you have a Netflix subscription, the app lets you install many games that aren’t looking for microtransactions within.

Most of the Ace Attorney games are on smartphones.

I’ve also been having a lot of fun with Zenless Zone Zero. F2P, combat is based around swapping between a team of three, and making use of parry / dodge frame effects.

I setup retroarch to play gameboy games. With some fiddling even I got touhou 1-5 to working stable and correct. Highly recommend.

Boardgame ports are nice, but sometime difficult on a small screen. I am also enjoying Star Traders: Frontiers. There are even the Old Total Wars games. All this are not free though. Netflix has several good games if you are subscribed.

I like MinuteKnights, or really any of the games from the dev.

I've been enjoying Pocket Rogues lately. The full version. I'm not a huge fan of roguelights and I hate roguelikes, but since I currently can't afford a replacement for my old busted laptop because I'm disabled and poor in America, it's really not easy to get games that are worth a damn. I do have one of those controller adapters for my phone so that it's actually playable. I tried to using it for Minecraft but Minecraft was never meant to be played on a console and shoehorning it onto one was a bad idea from day one.

ScummVM with a ton of classic adventures like Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle or Broken Sword.

Beneath a Steel Sky and Flight of the Amazon Queen are free.

If you want to play an RPG via ScummVM, World of Xeen is awesome.

Roguelikes really do fit the mobile format, don't they?

Peglin has a decent port, too, and it's also a good fit. Solitairica is a fun mobile-first take that may scratch the Balatro itch when you're done with Balatro.

For people who are into more linear stuff, Capcom and Square have ported a lot of their portfolio. The Phoenix Wright games are there, a bunch Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, too. The Layton games as well, which are a good match for smaller sessions. They went ahead and put the painfully underrated Dragon Quest Builders in phones, but you'd better have a beefy phone and/or a power bank for that one.

Oh, if you were able to play Dead Cells on a phone effectively you may also be interested to know that Bloodstained and Castlevania SotN both have competent mobile ports. I wouldn't choose those versions over a handheld, but hey, they exist.

Speaking of unexpected but decent ports. The old Baldur's Gate games, for some reason.

Oh, Mini Metro is in there. Human Resource Machine is in there, if you want to brush up on your assembly coding skills while you poop. Hearthsotne and Marvel Snap are good to play on phones if you are into competitive CCGs...

I think this is no longer making sense. It's like asking if there are any decent games on Steam.

I'm a little partial to FOSS, but:

• Mindustry
• Endless Sky
• Luanti
• Lemuroid (an emulator suite)
• I've heard you can get OpenMW running on mobile, but I haven't tried it personally

Breakout 71. It's a roguelike brick breaker. Quite addictive and well made.

I like casual stuff like sudoku, Balatro, flappy golf. I think I have KotOR too. Classic port.

Retro Bowl is good. Pay to unlock, but it is one time payment and the game is solid

One of my personal favorites has been Plants vs Zombies 2: Reflourished. It's a modded version of the original game that removes all ads and microtransactions and is a challenging enough game.

Also, Shattered Pixel Dungeon. Simple enough to figure out, simple controls, and no 2 runs are the same until you unlock seeded runs by beating a run ( which I can somehow never do ).

Magic Survival, the inspiration behind Vampire Survivors. Never paid a dime, got over 100h at this point, and is the only mobile game on my phone, it's great.

Sad the dev never made a PC port.

Slice and Dice is great

I'm a fan of survivor.io it's a rogue-like twin stick I suppose.

Dolphin if you're into GameCube games. I've played through all of Paper Mario and smugglers run on my phone. Now I'm spending a majority of my time in the original Animal Crossing.

No, not really. This isn't the platform you want for good games unfortunately.

League of Legends Wild Rift is the only competitive mobile game I'm aware of that isn't pay to win, it also happens to be well polished and v fun

Backgammon, chess.

• Sky: Children of the Light
• Balatro
• Vampire Survivors
• Cookie Run: Tower of Adventures
• Pokemon TCG Pocket
• Minecraft

Polytopia? No ads, game is 100% playable for free, cross platform online multiplayer.

Plenty of NES and SNES games emulate nicely on a phone, even with touch controls.

I've enjoyed TES: Blades and Fallout Shelter, though I think they both got too micro transactional.

RetroArch even with onscreen keys is surprisingly good, if that's your thing.

Osmos and Super Hexagon are oldies but goodies, and not pay to play.

I really like Space Flight Simulator. It’s a simplified 2d kerbal basically. Also a sucker for Antiyoy, Balatro, Auralux, and of course an emulator (delta for iOS) so I can play pokemon games.

Cat Bird is a very simple indie platformer that's for free on the play store that ai kinda love alot. If you don't mind doing some set up, emulation makes you phone a pretty solid portable console. On the ports side of things, Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night are pretty good games

The Balatro port is also good.